The Marsala landing

On the 17th of March, as we well know, we celebrate the one hundred and fifty years of Unification of Italy, a unit which is linked to the historical figure of Garibaldi and his army of one thousand combatants.

It is in way that the history of Garibaldi, of the city of Marsala and of the wine which bears his name, to be inexorably intertwined.
The Marsala is a sweet and fortified wine, produced in Sicily in the town of Marsala and in the province of Trapani, with the exception of Pantelleria, Favignana and Alcamo.

The marsala was "discovered" in 1773 by the English merchant John Woodhouse, who stopped in Marsala because of a storm. This unhappy mishap turned into a fortunate event for Woodhouse, when, in a tavern, he enjoyed one of the best wines produced here, the “perpeetum”. Whoodhouse covered immediately the potential of the marsala wine, so he sent it in England where he received a lot of success. Then Woodhouse decided to start the Marsala production and the marketing, using the “soleras” method for aging.

This method consists in superimposing the oak barrels, in order to fill the higher barrels. After a year the wine is poured into the lower barrels and the new wine in the higher ones. This annually. Then the wine placed in the lower is the result of varying ages.

To company Woodhouse arrived other Englishmen, but it was only in 1833 that a Sicilian businessman, Florio, began producing the marsala, the first DOP Italian wine. It was the strong presence of British ships in the harbor that prevented the Bourbons of firing on the Garibaldi’s vessels, who, returned two years later in the Sicilian town, asked to drink the sweet wine sipped in the landing night: the marsala liqueur, which was immediately, renamed Garibaldi Dolce.

Fortunately, today find best italian wines is simple; we have only to go to the local supermarket or buy wine online.